2
As the footman opened the door of the brougham, a door far back in the dim porch was flung back, letting out a flood of light, and the swift figure of a parlourmaid who seized Miriam’s Gladstone bag and the silver-mounted Banbury Park umbrella and led the way across the porch into the soft golden blaze. The Saratoga trunk had gone away with the brougham, and in a moment the door was closed and Miriam was standing, frightened and alone, in a fire-lit, lamp-lit, thickly carpeted enclosure within sound of a thin chalky voice saying “Ello, ello.” It seemed to come from above her. “Ello—ello—ello—ello,” it said busily, hurrying about somewhere above as she gazed about the terrifying hall. It was somehow like the box office of a large theatre, only much better; the lamplight, there seemed to be several lamps shaded with low-hanging old gold silk, and the rosy light from the huge clear fire in a deep grate fell upon a thick pale greeny yellow carpet, the little settees with their huge cushions, and the strange-looking pictures set low on dull gold walls. In two directions the hall went dimly away towards low archways screened by silently hanging bead curtains. “Ello—ello—ello—ello,” said the voice coming quickly downstairs. Half raising her eyes Miriam saw a pale turquoise blue silk dress, long and slender with deep frills of black chiffon round the short sleeves and a large frill draping the low-cut bodice, a head and face, sheeny bronze and dead white, coming across the hall.
“Ow-de-do; so glad you’ve come,” said the voice, and two thin fingers and a small thin crushed handkerchief were pressed against her half-raised hand.
“Are you famished? Deadly awful journey! I’m glad you’re tall. Wiggerson’ll take up your things. You must be starvin’. Don’t change. There’s only me. Don’t be long. I shall tell them to put on the soup.”
Gently propelled towards the staircase Miriam went mechanically up the wide shallow stairs towards the parlourmaid waiting at the top. Behind her she heard the swift fuffle of Mrs. Corrie’s dress, the swish of a bead curtain and the thin tuneless voice inaccurately humming in some large near room, “Jack’s the boy for work; Jack’s the boy for play.” She followed the maid across the landing, walking swiftly, as Mrs. Corrie had done—the same greeny carpet, but white walls up here and again strange pictures hung low, on a level with your eyes, strange soft tones ... crayons? ... pastels?—what was the word—she was going to live with them, she would be able to look at them—and everything up here, in the soft pink light. There were large lamps with rose-pink shades. The maid held back a pink silk curtain hanging across an alcove, and Miriam went through to the open door of her room. “Harris will bring up your trunk later, miss—if you like to leave your keys with me,” said the maid behind her. “Oh yes,” said Miriam carelessly, going on into the room. “Oh, I don’t know where they are. Oh, it doesn’t matter, I’ll manage.”
“Very good, miss,” said Wiggerson politely, and came forward to close the bedroom door.
Miriam flung off her outer things and faced herself in the mirror in her plain black hopsack dress with the apple green velveteen pipings about the tight bodice and the square box sleeves which filled the square mirror from side to side as she stood. “This dress is a nightmare in this room,” she thought, puffing up her hair under her fringe-net with a hat-pin. “Never mind, I mustn’t think about it,” she added hurriedly, disconcerted for a moment by the frightened look in her eyes. The distant soft flat silvery swell of a little gong sent her hurrying to the mound of soft bath towel in the wide pale blue wash-hand basin. She found a bulging copper hot-water jug, brilliantly polished, with a wicker-covered handle. The water hissed gently into the wide shallow basin, sending up a great cloud of comforting steam. Dare’s soap ... extraordinary. People like this being taken in by advertisements ... awful stuff, full of free soda, any transparent soap is bad for the skin, must be, in the nature of things ... makes your skin feel tight. Perhaps they only use it for their hands.... Advertisement will do anything, Pater said.... Perhaps in houses like this—plonk, it certainly made a lovely hard ring falling into the basin—where everything was warm and clean and fragrant even Dare’s soap could not hurt you. The room behind her seemed to encourage the idea. But surely it couldn’t be her room. It was a spare room. They had put her into it for her month on trial. Could it possibly be hers, just her room, if she stayed ... the strange, beautiful, beautiful long wide hang of the faintly patterny faintly blue curtains covering the whole of the window space; the firelight on them as she came into the room with Wiggerson, the table with a blotter, there had been a table by the door with a blotter, as Wiggerson spoke. She looked round, there it was ... the blue covered bed, the frilled pillows, high silky-looking bed curtains with some sort of little pattern on them, the huge clear fire, the big wicker chair.